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“Helen! Are you coming?”

“Yes!” Helen called back, yanking her dress on. It was a bit small, but she could manage.

“Where are we going, Dad?” she asked. She didn’t often get to spend time with her father these days. He was always working, always trying to make enough money to support Helen, her mother, and her brothers and sister.

“We’ll be getting the rent,” he answered.

“Oh.” So that was why he had time for her today. The rent was what kept them going, what gave them enough money so that all Helen had to worry about was her too-tight dress and raggedy old slip. Other children had to worry about food or even their homes. The Resnicks were luckier. Before the Depression had begun, when the Resnick family’s store had still been successful, Mr. Resnick had bought two houses and rented them as apartments. Where the family would be without that rent money now, Helen really couldn’t imagine.

“But, Dad, if you sold the houses, we’d get more money.”

He smiled at her with a tired sigh. “Aren’t you a little young to worry about money?” She didn’t answer, and he sighed again. “Helen, we don’t know when it’s going to be easier. If we sold the apartments, we’d have a lot of money, but it would be all at once. What if, after a long time, we ran out of that money and the economy still wasn’t better?”

“Won’t it get better?” Helen whispered.

“Of course it will. We just don’t know when.” He was quiet for a few moments. Then he said, “Besides, if we sold the apartments, the families who live there would have to move.”

*  *  *  *  *

Helen nodded. That made sense. Some of the families probably wouldn’t be able to pay for a different apartment or for the movers to help them get there.

Mrs. Miller, who had no children and a husband who was still working, gave them the rent money right away in dollar bills, but Mr. Schmidt was still searching his home for coins when they arrived. Apologizing, he gave them a bag of nickels, dimes, and quarters.

“Aren’t you going to count it, Dad?” Helen asked as they left.

“No,” he said. “I don’t need to.” He was always unhappy to take money from his poorer tenants, but as Helen’s mother said, that was the only way they were surviving. The money in Mr. Resnick’s hand by the end of today must be enough to last for the whole month.

The other house was next-door, and three families lived there. Everything went smoothly at the first two apartments, but both Helen and her father were worried about the third. The Katz family never had enough money, and it had become harder and harder to accept their rent, even though her father had lowered it. He said it was important to be especially good to this family because Mr. Katz had served in the army in the Great War and deserved their gratitude.

Mrs. Katz opened the door when Helen’s father knocked. Her eyes were red — from crying, Helen thought. “Good afternoon, Mr. Resnick,” she said, hands nervously smoothing her gray dress.

“How are you, Mrs. Katz?” he asked.

“We’re . . . we’re getting by,” she said, but she wouldn’t meet his eyes or even Helen’s. “You’re here for the rent.”

“Yes, Mrs. Katz, I’m afraid so.”

“Please come in.”

The inside of the apartment was always beautifully clean. Mr. Katz and the two children were sitting at a table, waiting for Mr. Resnick. They all have such thin faces! Helen thought. She was embarrassed, suddenly, by her own round cheeks and strong body. They felt like marks of her guilt when she saw the little girl’s narrow, sad face and the boy’s big eyes.

Mr. Katz gave Helen’s father the money he was holding, and Mr. Resnick thanked him and turned to go.

“Mr. Resnick?” Mrs. Katz said before they could leave. He turned to look at her. In a trembling voice she told him, “We haven’t eaten in two days.”

Two days! Helen couldn’t imagine such a thing. Her stomach ached just to think of it.

They went back to where the family sat. “Mr. Katz, is that true?”

Mr. Katz didn’t look up or speak but nodded. The skinny little girl began to cry. Without a word, Helen’s father put all of the Katzes’ rent money back on the table. Then he solemnly took out the rest of the money he’d collected that day and counted out two dollars in coins.

“Helen,” he said, “I want you to go down to the grocer’s and use this to buy food and bring it right back here.”

“Yes, Dad,” she answered and started running. Long after she was out of earshot, Mrs. Katz’s tearful apologies and thanks echoed in her ears.

Helen was so shocked by the family’s story that she was all the way to the grocer’s before she realized that this was more money than she’d ever held in her life. She hung on to it tightly, to make sure that not a penny would escape. She’d never been given such responsibility! She was just like her mother, with two whole dollars to spend on groceries!

And so, just like Mom, Helen chose tasty, cheap, and good foods — bread, flour, beans, milk, oats, and peanut butter — everything her mother would get. She kept a careful count of how many pennies each item cost and piled the groceries near the counter since there were far too many to carry without a bag. Two dollars bought such a lot!

“Is your mother sick, young lady?” the grocer asked when he added up her purchases and packed them in bags.

“No,” Helen told him proudly. “I’m on an errand.”

“Is that so? That’ll be a dollar and ninety-eight cents.”

Helen gave him the two dollars. Look at all this food, she thought happily. And I didn’t even spend all the money! But then she became worried. Her father had asked her to spend two dollars. He didn’t say anything about having money left over. Would he be pleased or angry if she brought back two pennies?

“How much is this?” she asked, holding up a pretty candy she’d seen in her own grocery store last week. Mother would never spend any money at all on candy.

“Just a penny.”

A whole penny for something so small! No wonder Mom wouldn’t buy it. But Helen thought of the little boy and girl she was bringing this food to. Surely they never had candy. And if she, who had enough to eat, wanted candy so much, surely they would want it even more.

“I’ll buy two of them,” Helen said and added them to the pile.

“Then it’s two dollars.” Helen nodded and picked up the bags.

They were heavy, but she carried them back to the house, where her father was still talking to Mr. Katz. Everyone’s eyes flew to her, and her father smiled. The children gave little sighs of pleasure when they saw each favorite food, and when Helen reached into the bag and took out the two candies, they both shrieked with joy. Mr. and Mrs. Katz laughed at that, and Helen thought it was their first laugh in a long, long time.

*  *  *  *  *

“How much was the candy?” her father asked on the way home.

“A penny each,” she admitted. Had it been a waste of money? Was he angry?

But then he said, “You did a good job.”

They were quiet for a while, and a worried look grew on her father’s face.

“Dad?” she asked.

“What is it?”

“Will there be enough left for us?”

“I think so. I hope so. Yes,” he said. “It might be a little harder than usual, but we’ll be all right.”

A few more minutes passed.

“I’m glad we helped them,” Helen said.

“I’m glad, too. We couldn’t have not helped them.”

*  *  *  *  *

Helen’s supper that night was very tasty and even better since she knew that across town two other children were eating, too. And after supper, she closed her eyes and enjoyed that wonderful candy with the skinny, hungry little girl and the tiny boy with the big eyes.